›Nordic Rebirth‹ –The ›Völkische‹ Movement and Race Biology

In the last third of the 19th century, the German word ›völkisch‹ (tr.: of the people) came into use as a term referring to an ethnically pure, generally anti-Semitic form of nationalism. The German nationalist movements claimed that the origins of civilisation were in the North. Unsettled by rapid industrialisation, people began to look to simpler ways of life and were won over by the imagined ideal of a past Nordic era: the Nordic ›barbarian‹ was reinterpreted as a role model, and his ›rightful successors‹ demanded recognition by the rest of the world.

There were close relations between German and Swedish race biologists. They devised a system of ›racial types‹ and constructed a hierarchy of peoples with, of course, ›pure-blooded‹ Scandinavians and Germans at the top.